The flock gazed out the darkened windows of the limo. This was pretty much the farthest situation from anything that Max would have agreed to. They were surrounded, trapped in a car driven by a stranger, with tons of people taking pictures.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Jeb asked.
That was enough to decide it for Angel. “Yep. It’s showtime, folks,” she said, popping her door open. The flock heard murmurs ripple through the crowd. Then people were jostling, trying to get closer, trying to see them as they spilled out of the limo.
“It’s the bird kids!” Flashes went off like a hundred tiny fireworks.
Nudge gave a big smile, posing for the cameras. “Hello,” she said, changing her angles. Dylan looked down at first but couldn’t help giving shy smiles to the adoring onlookers. Gazzy bounced up and down and waved.
“Get me out of here,” said Iggy, whose superior sensory skills normally made him comfortable weaving his way through any scene of chaos. “This is giving me the willies.”
Angel looked at him, surprised. “Everything is fine,” she said firmly. “Let’s go inside.” The crowd parted around her as if she had waved a magic wand. With her enhanced raptor vision, Angel could see everything in the smoky darkness as they weaved through the restaurant.
Their contact, a talk show host named Madeline Hammond, ran forward, her hands out.
“Kids!” she said, beaming a thousand-watt smile. “Thanks so much for coming! Hey, give us a little room, will ya?” she called to the crowd, and people edged back. “Welcome to the pre-party! Isn’t this great? The Harrells are going to play later, and Beth Duncraft and Fala Cochran are here.” Her gaze fell on Dylan just then, and she looked up into his turquoise eyes. “Oh, my goodness,” she said slowly. “Who are you?”
“I’m Dylan,” he said. “The new bird kid on the block.”
Madeline looked stunned, then recovered herself, turning to speak to the crowd. “They sure can make ’em, right, folks? Is this guy gorgeous or what?” The crowd roared its approval. Madeline smiled. “All of you are just fantastic!”
Nudge squealed with delight. She turned and posed again, waving.
“Let me introduce you to some people,” said Madeline Hammond, and for the next twenty minutes, Angel was absorbed in a blur of smiles and air kisses and shaking hands. But with every passing moment, noises seemed to grow louder, colors seemed to get brighter, and her skin felt more and more itchy and tight.
She glanced at Nudge, who was beaming up into the face of a boy currently starring in a popular sitcom. He looked about sixteen, and Angel grinned, wondering if he knew that, despite her height, Nudge was only elev—twelve.
“And how did you learn to fly?” a reporter asked Dylan.
“I got pushed off a roof,” he said truthfully. The crowd laughed, eating him up.
In the darkness, Angel saw Gazzy and Iggy sitting at the restaurant’s bar, taking turns flicking almonds into glasses as if it were an advanced game of tiddlywinks. Several Hollywood writer-producer types seemed to be regressing to childhood as they joined the competition, guffawing with the boys and making a scene.
Dylan was surrounded by slinky, admiring girls, some of whom Angel recognized from TV. He was smiling, talking, turning on his own star quality, but Angel thought his expression looked strained, and his skin pale and clammy.
Dylan + pale skin =? Does not compute.
And that’s when it occurred to her. Dylan always looked perfect. Even when he’d just been shredded by Erasers.
There was something very wrong with him. With all of them.
That was when Angel looked down at her hands, seeing them clearly in the dim light. And she screamed.
63
“MA’AM, YOU SHOULD SEE THIS.” The tech nervously pointed at the surveillance screen.
The head of information stared at the face of Subject 6. It was covered with huge oozing pustules, like boils. The subject was crying, even as she tried to keep from scratching her skin raw. There was much activity in the area as the other subjects started to gather around number 6.
“Have you seen Twenty-two yet?” the head asked.
“Yes,” the tech replied grimly, just as the subject in question came into view. The tech enhanced the night-vision capabilities of the camera. Subject 22 was indeed also covered with the plaguelike skin lesions.
“Another malfunction. Unbelievable,” the head of information whispered. “This couldn’t have been from the reactant. It was tested a hundred times. We know the effect it has. It couldn’t have done this. In fact—I believe it was tested on Twenty-two himself when he was six months old. Check the records on that before I inform the doctor.”
The tech nodded.
“ASAP,” the head pressed. “The doctor is going to be very, very upset when he—” She broke off and squinted at the screen. There seemed to be some kind of commotion. People pressing together, people yelling.
“What’s going on now?”
The tech turned up the volume and tried refocusing the camera. “It may be that one of the subjects just collapsed? I’m not sure. Let me come in closer….”
“We have to get field reports!” the head yelled, pulling out her phone to mobilize the street team. “This could be turning into an emergency scenario. We are not going to lose any of the subjects on my watch.”
64
I’M NOT CLAIRVOYANT or anything. I can’t read minds or pick up on stray thoughts the way Angel can. But I know where Los Angeles is, and I can read a huge blinking sign that says “Bird kids here tonight! Come meet the flock! Get your tickets at TicketsPlus!”
I pointed, and Fang nodded. “It’s a thin clue, but I say we follow it,” I said. We angled downward, avoiding cell towers and trying not to breathe in the smog, which you could have cut with a knife and spread on toast. Not that you’d want to.
The sign was perched atop a four-story building that looked as if it had once been a movie theater. On the ground floor was a restaurant called Furioso. Signs on the sidewalk proclaimed the opportunity to talk to “Nature’s Marvels, Today Only.”
“Nature had nothing to do with it,” I muttered.
“Good thing the kids are keeping a low profile,” Fang commented.
As we got closer to Furioso, people started streaming out the front doors, yelling and screaming. Burly bouncers were trying to control them, but no one can withstand the kick of a Jimmy Choo stiletto in the shin.
We waited a moment, but the flock wasn’t among the escapees. Which meant they were inside. I didn’t even have to think, just dived between designer-clad bodies.
“No one goes in!” a bouncer said, looming large in front of me. “Everyone’s clearing out!”
“We’ve got VIP passes,” I told him. Fang and I spread our wings. “Up and away!” We catapulted into the air and flew right over him as he looked up at us in a daze.
After that, LA’s young and restless got out of our way.
Inside, it was dark enough to hide most face-lifts, but it took only a moment to locate the flock—they were standing by the one light source in the place. I also spotted Jeb’s sandy hair. At the same time, I took in the fact that three people dressed in black were converging on the flock, and they didn’t look like hospitality associates.
I nodded at Fang, and he broke away, circling behind them as I pulled back into the shadows. Nudge sniffled and caught sight of me. I was shocked to see that her eyes were almost swollen shut. I glimpsed the others’ faces and noticed weird spots and swelling. WTH?
I put a finger to my lips, then circled it in the air. Nudge nodded almost imperceptibly, reaching behind her to tap Iggy’s hand twice. He tapped Gazzy’s hand twice, and Gazzy stopped blinking back tears and went quietly on alert.
So pretty much everyone was already primed by the time the biggest guy reached Jeb, pulled a gun out of his coat, and jabbed it into Jeb’s side.
“Nobody move!” the guy barked. “You’re all going to come with us! Some
body wants to see you.”
“I don’t think anyone wants to see us looking like this,” said Dylan.
The woman closest to him whirled, also pulling out a gun. In less time than it takes to tell, Dylan chopped the gun out of her hand, then grabbed her, locking her arms behind her back. So smoothly, so professionally, it was almost as though he had known she was coming.
Immediately, I swept my foot under the third one’s shoes, knocking him off balance, then clapped my hands hard over his ears. He shrieked in pain as his eardrums popped, and he fell. I planted my foot firmly on his neck, ready to stomp if he moved a muscle.
Meanwhile…
Almost as if in slow motion…
The gun skidded across the floor. And guess which of us had her bird kid claws all over that grisly weapon in the blink of an eye?
You got it. The scary seven-year-old with a leadership complex.
Having been subjected to the threat of guns way too many times in our short lives, the flock were not fans of them. Didn’t touch them, didn’t believe in them, didn’t want anything to do with them. And, fortunately, didn’t have a shred of experience using them.
So looking at Angel holding a gun? It wasn’t just terrifying. It was tragic. I felt crushed by the horror of what our lives had come to.
My sweet little Angel, looking like a murderer in a pink party dress.
I might say this a lot, but: This was like my worst nightmare. For real this time.
But then it got worse.
Because when Angel lifted the gun, she pointed it at me.
65
“NOBODY MOVES UNTIL I TELL them to,” Angel said calmly, as if she’d been doing this—or at least watching R-rated Mafia movies after I’d gone to sleep—her whole life.
I must admit, as a tactic the shock factor was super effective. Everyone was frozen with disbelief. For a moment, it was as if we were all on the same team, trying to talk a psycho down from the ledge. Every single one of us wanted that gun out of that child’s hands.
The scary thing was, she didn’t look like a child anymore. She looked very, very focused. And I was very, very focused on the barrel of the gun.
“Put it down,” the guy holding Jeb told her. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Yes, she does,” said Dylan seriously.
“Well, then, what does she think she’s doing?” the woman he had captive asked through clenched teeth.
“Okay, so what happens next is that everyone shuts up and listens to what I have to say,” Angel demanded.
Tell me to shut up, and I speak. “I’m listening, Angel. I simply cannot wait to hear this one.”
She gave me a look. Listen to me, Max.
“One by one, and only when I say,” Angel began, “the grown-ups will turn around and walk away without hurting us. And if you don’t do it, I’ll pull the trigger. And then what happens?”
“You’ll kill Max,” Fang said hoarsely.
“Right.” Her grip, her arm, didn’t waver. “And you grown-ups know as well as I do that Max is the prize. The only prize that really matters to your boss. You know exactly who I’m talking about. He would be very, very mad if she died and it was your fault, wouldn’t he? That would be very, very bad for you. Wouldn’t it?”
“You wouldn’t kill a member of your own flock. You’d never do it!” the guy whose neck was under my foot cried from the floor.
“Is that what you think?” Angel smiled. “Max, what do you think?”
I only needed to consider for a millisecond. “No question about it,” I said, staring her down. “She would do it.”
“Give us one good reason why we should believe that!” squawked Dylan’s captive.
“In case you guys didn’t catch last week’s episode, I’m out of the flock,” I informed them, letting my voice shake as much as possible. “Angel has no allegiance to me. She’s wanted me gone for a long time. And in case you didn’t catch all of the episodes from the past year, Angel is… unbalanced.”
“Untrustworthy,” Fang seconded.
“Unpredictable,” Jeb added.
“Dangerous,” Dylan chimed in. The other kids were, thankfully, too scared to speak up.
“Right,” Angel said slowly. “That’s just the word I would use. But I think everyone understands that now. So, Dylan, you can let your lady there go. She’s under control. Nice and easy, ma’am. Just turn around and walk away.”
As Dylan slowly loosened his grip, the woman’s eyes glazed over, and zombie-like, she headed out of the restaurant. Angel’s gaze was back on me now, strong and steady.
“Max, I think the gentleman under your foot is ready now. Bye-bye. Leave. Don’t ever come looking for us again,” she told him firmly.
Even after seeing Angel in action all these years, I was still awed by her powers as I lifted my foot and watched the man peel himself from the floor and stumble out.
“And finally, you, sir, with the gun. You’re going to leave now without hurting any of us bird kids. Go home and forget everything that just happened. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, with a bizarre expression on his face.
Then he pulled the trigger.
There was a pop, and Jeb collapsed. The rest of us gasped in horror.
“I didn’t hurt any of you bird kids,” he said emotionlessly. “Just like you said.”
Looking dazed, he dropped his gun to the floor and ran out.
66
JEB ALWAYS SAID HE’D TAKE a bullet for us. Now that he had, it significantly changed my sense of superiority over him. If he died, I would have some major soul-searching to do. Advice: Don’t wait until someone you have issues with—especially someone you’re related to—gets shot before you work it out.
Fortunately, the bullet seemed to have missed the important parts, but he’d lost a lot of blood, so there was no way we could avoid the dreaded hospital. I’d rather be in a zoo. Instead I was in a waiting room, taking out my frustrations on a vending machine that wasn’t working. I really needed some chocolate.
“Max!” I heard someone call. I felt my stomach unknot slightly.
“Mom!” I hurried to her, and we hugged. I’m not a huggy person, but her hugs were pretty much the best hugs on earth.
“Jeb’s out of surgery,” she said. “It looks like he’ll be fine.”
Fang and I led my mom to a room where the rest of the flock was under observation. The “agents” that Angel had hired had set up their private security guys outside the door—they didn’t want word of this leaking out. These kids were no longer marketable.
“Dr. Martinez!” Nudge said, managing a weak smile. Mom was good about not grimacing. Nudge’s skin looked like chocolate pudding bubbling in a pot on the stove. The rest looked like they had been dipped in a cauldron of lye. Doctors had swabbed the flock’s sores, taken blood, taken their temperatures—but hadn’t found squat.
“Oh, my gosh, Nudge,” my mom said gently. She smoothed some of Nudge’s corkscrew curls off her forehead, then went around and said hi to everyone else.
“I’m Dylan,” Dylan said when she paused by his bed, looking confused.
“He’s the latest, um, acquisition,” I explained weakly. Even with his messed-up skin, he still looked like he’d been designed by Gods R Us. Except right now it was Trolls R Us. But, like, a troll who would totally be a pinup in all the troll teen magazines.
“Hi, Dylan,” my mom said. “I’m Valencia Martinez, Max’s mom.”
Dylan’s puffy eyes widened. “You have a mother?” he asked me. “Wow. I had no idea. Do you have a father too, then?”
Bad, bad question. My mom quickly changed the subject. “You know, I read about a case where someone poisoned a spy with a radioactive element,” she said. “The pictures I saw kind of looked like this.”
“Oh, holy crap,” I said, putting my hand to my mouth.
“It’s not radiation poisoning,” said a voice.
“Jeb!” My mom went over and closed the door behi
nd him.
“How do you know?” I demanded of Jeb. “Did you have something to do with this?”
“No,” said Jeb. He was wearing a hospital gown, open in the back, and I hoped he was enjoying the breeze. An IV dripped into his arm, and he had wheeled its little stand in with him. He looked pale and weak—after all, he had taken a bullet for us. Maybe I should be a tad less accusatory.
“No,” he repeated. “And I hope I’m wrong, but I think it’s an… accelerator of some kind. A genetic accelerator.”
“What the heck is that?” Gazzy asked.
Jeb paused. “Well… it’s something that would react with your genes. Basically introducing new mutations and speeding up mutations you already have. I think all of us got dosed, except maybe Max and Fang, because they were gone. But it’s having an effect only on you, whose DNA has already been modified.”
There was an appalled silence. I’d been gone for, like, two days, and in that time, everything had completely careened out of control.
“But what if it helps us become even better?” Angel said, ever the creepy optimist. Her normally beautiful face looked like a personal-size pizza with eyes. “We could be like superheroes!”
“Yeah, so far that’s working out well for you,” I said, gesturing to everyone’s ruined skin. “Do you have any idea who would—” I stopped as the obvious answer came to me. “Dr. Seersucker.”
Angel sat up. “Dr. Gunther-Hagen is really brilliant, Max.”
“You want to be accelerated? Fine. But you have no idea what’s going to happen to you next. We already know that your good doctor’s self-healing genetics can have some pretty scary side effects.”
Angel frowned, and Dylan looked concerned. I’d forgotten he had been gifted with Dr. Gunther-Hagen’s magic spit.
My mom turned to Jeb, who was leaning against a wall, looking gray. “Is there any way to know what will happen to them? How toxic is it? Is it deadly? Is there any way to get it out of their systems?”
“Um, not really, I’m not sure, I don’t think so, and I doubt it,” said Jeb, trying to answer all her questions. “My guess is that this initial bad reaction might be the shock of having it introduced to their systems. I’m hoping that once it’s absorbed, these side effects will go away.”
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